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ASCO University Adds Team-based Care Webinar to Curriculum for Nurse Practitioner and Physician Assistants

Dec 19, 2012

In an effort to expand its curriculum to focus on issues relevant to nurse practitioners and physician assistants (and the oncologists who work with them), ASCO University recently hosted a live webinar entitled, “Team-based Care in Oncology.” The goal of this web-based e-seminar was to answer questions about practicing in a team-based environment. For example, how do you maximize team effectiveness? How do you integrate a new graduate versus an experienced practitioner into the team? Is personalized training important? 

Three expert faculty members presented during this live seminar and provided their unique perspectives on working in a team-based practice. Todd Pickard, MMSc, PA-C from M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Jan Hronek,  MSN, ACNP, AOCNP from Sarah Cannon Cancer Institute/Tennessee Oncology, and Kathleen Beekman, MD discussed utilizing NPs and PAs in practice and the factors that can impact performance, training and orientation of new team members, and the importance of communication.

Elaine L. Towle, CMPE, Director of Oncology Metrics in Chester, NH and a member of the planning group that helped to develop this seminar, believes that regardless of practice setting, team-based care is an important topic. "Nurse practitioners and physician assistants are increasingly prevalent in oncology practices in all settings, and learning from experts about how best to incorporate these non-physician practitioners into practice is essential.” Ms. Towle believes that this course is especially important for medical oncologists who have not worked with NPs or PAs before, or who have had an unsuccessful experience in a previous practice.  “The keys to a successful team-based practice are quality patient care and practice efficiency,” she comments.

The video capture of this presentation is now available on ASCO University for purchase (university.asco.org/team-based-care-oncology-capture). The full course contains the video of the presentation, a PDF of the slide set, course references, relevant ASCO Virtual Meeting presentations, links to Journal of Oncology Practice articles, and three podcasts that address the areas of Billing/Coding,  Pre-Hire/Hiring Process, and State Regulatory Issues.
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